As the years passed, and his distinction as the best travel writer of his generation grew, it is both fascinating and moving to read Paddy’s letters about his return to central and eastern Europe as he retraces his prewar steps in order to write his two most remarkable books, A Time of Gifts (1977) and Between the Woods and the Water (1986), kindly christened by Debo ‘Shanks’s  Europe’. The great houses he knew are in decay, ‘a series of Bridesheads’, or inhabited by nice peasants, who tell him they feel guilty ‘but it’s not our fault’; those of his old friends and loves he can find have all suffered badly. Meanwhile to general astonishment Debo takes up writing herself in order to celebrate Chatsworth; encouraged by Paddy, who tells her just to let rip, she eventually produces ten books to his nine, claiming that it is easier to write a book than read one. This pose falters only once, when she admits to great admiration for Bruce Chatwin’s On The Black Hill.

In their sixties and seventies, they are both almost famous. He is reunited on television with the German general from Crete, while she is filmed rounding up sheep with her working collie (‘I rather dread it because of my awful voice, but the dog didn’t do too badly.’) She tells him about addressing chartered surveyors on redundant farm buildings; he tells her at length about swimming the Hellespont, quite a feat for a man of 69. She writes back: ‘Congrats on that, and don’t do it again, eh.’

Along with earnestness and politics, sorrow and trouble are kept at bay; it is a surprise to find her husband’s deadly alcoholism even mentioned (briefly and in a footnote) and Paddy admitting to a bout of melancholia (once). When old age and death begin to loom (a favourite Mitford word — ‘ any hope of you looming?’), their courage is exemplary. ‘It is a swizz everyone vanishing like this’ sounds like Debo, but is in fact Paddy, busy writing obituaries. Before long they are exchanging jokes about nice Dr Oblivion, who comes to call all too often these days; his eyes begin to fail, she suffers a slight stroke. When in the middle of the night at home in the southern Peloponnese he wakes suddenly and misreads the clock he thinks it is time to get up. Realising his mistake, he sits down to write to Debo.

In a way its marvellous; all these dark hours in hand, while sodden slumber still enfolds the world, perfect for what I’m doing this very moment.

This marvellous correspondence celebrates two of the most important things in the world, courage and friendship. Long may it continue to sustain both writers.

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